


The case of the craft club killer

by dogandmonkeyshow



Series: Watson's Woes JWP 2018 stories [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Craft club killer, Gen, Professional rivalries, sort of casefic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-04 23:36:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15157748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dogandmonkeyshow/pseuds/dogandmonkeyshow
Summary: “Someone—probably the killer—decided to leave Beverley a message,” Donovan said with a wry twist of her wrist to show John something everyone else had seen but which still eluded him.“Huh,” John said, glancing between the reversed stitching that spelled out WHORE and the grandmotherly-looking corpse propped up in her chair. “I guess everyone was young once.”





	The case of the craft club killer

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Watson's Woes JWP 2018 fic fest, prompt #3: When Shall We Three Meet Again? Have three characters - and ONLY three - appear in your work today.

“Whoever the killer is, they’re left-handed,” Donovan said as she gently rummaged around the victim, who was propped bolt upright in a wing-back chair as if the blood saturating the upholstery had glued her body into a perfect 90-degree angle.

“Nope,” Sherlock rebutted; John settled into parade rest, anticipating another tiresome bout of competitive posturing between the two old antagonists.

“And it’s most likely a woman, either over sixty or under twenty-five,” Donovan continued, ignoring both Sherlock’s words and his expression of cartoonish disdain. “Want to know how I _deduced_ it?” she asked, smirking up at him.

“Oh, do please enlighten us.”

John saw from his friend’s relaxed shoulders that he saw this as just a game and wasn’t taking Donovan’s teasing amiss.

“The victim’s right-handed.” Donovan pointed at the woman’s hands, resting at her sides along the edges of the seat cushion.”

“Yes, obviously,” Sherlock drawled with eye-watering sarcasm that John feared might push Donovan into one of her pursed-lip rants, but she seemed to have recently developed the ability to let Sherlock’s (fake?) venom run off her back. Spending two years thinking you’d driven someone to suicide might just have that effect, John thought.

Donovan paused for a second and John sensed she was waiting until she had the attention of everyone in the room before delivering her _coup de grace_. “And if that’s the case, why is half this done by a left-handed person?” She pointed at the needlework piece crumpled on the victim’s lap.

“What?” Genuinely curious now, Sherlock shed his performance of disdain and dropped to his knees in front of the victim, pulled out his magnifying glass and proceeded to peer at the work in question. John let out a silent breath of relief that his modest skills as buffer wouldn’t be called into play. Rosie had been up all night and his brain felt like it was made of sawdust and dry-curd cottage cheese, so he was hardly in a fit state.

The tip of his nose almost touching the fabric, Sherlock noted, “Ah, the stitches cross in the opposite direction. You saw it from that distance?”

“Younger eyes, Freak.”

“Have you started building your cat collection, to go with the geriatric hobbies?” Sherlock shot right back as he stood. 

Donovan just cocked an eyebrow at him.

While the other two engaged in (blessedly) non-verbal warfare, John tried to imagine Donovan doing needlework and drew a complete blank. In fact, trying to imagine what she got up to in her spare time resulted in a blank all ‘round; Donovan had always struck him as being one of those coppers with no personal life, who lived for the job. But that was a lazy assumption, he knew, and if neither he nor Sherlock had any idea how she lived her private life, that was probably a smart plan on her part.

“That still doesn’t explain the connection to the killer. Or who it might be.” Sherlock glanced around the room. “Is Bartoli done with the body?”

“Yeah. Scurried out of the loo with about twelve bottles of pills.”

“What were they?”

“Why don’t you ask her? Whatever they were, she looked bloody happy about it. Pathologists,” she muttered darkly.

John prepared to step back out of the line of fire. To his surprise, Sherlock didn’t regale them with the expected excoriating critique of Donovan’s professional skills. Instead, he just cocked a meaningful eyebrow back at her and jerked the needlework out of the dead woman’s hand, allowing John to make an estimate of time of death based on how hard Sherlock had to work to get it. As John and Donovan watched, Sherlock peered at the partly-filled canvas, then, noticing something, moved over to one of the nearby floor lamps and examined the piece more closely, tilting it to catch the light at various angles.

“What?” Donovan asked as she joined him.

Sherlock held the piece out for her. “Old eyes, indeed,” he muttered as her expression changed from curiosity to consternation.

“It’s the ones you least expect, isn’t it?” She took the piece from Sherlock and examined the back. “They’ve picked out the old stitches and redone them backwards.”

“What?” John asked, deciding to stop resisting and join in the craft fair theme.

“How long would that have taken, Detective Inspector of Needlework?” Sherlock asked.

“Three, maybe four hours—”

“That certainly narrows the field of candidates,” Sherlock mused. 

“What?” John asked, feeling a little left out of the conversation; he was accustomed to being the one Sherlock showed off to, and the fact he seemed to have chosen Donovan this time was a bit irritating, John had to admit if he were being honest with himself.

“Someone—probably the killer—decided to leave Beverley a message,” Donovan said with a wry twist of her wrist to show John something everyone else had seen but which still eluded him.

“Huh,” John said, glancing between the reversed stitching that spelled out WHORE and the grandmotherly-looking corpse propped up in her chair. “I guess everyone was young once.”

“Just because you’re not getting any, John, doesn’t mean no one else over the age of forty is,” Sherlock replied, causing Donovan to chortle. The sight made John’ head feel as if it were about to cave in, so he went out into the corridor and sat on the floor. A minute later Sherlock joined him.

“The sight of blood giving you the vapours after all these years?”

“No, the sight of you and Donovan giggling together like schoolgirls is just making me question the nature of reality.”

“Do you a world of good, I’m sure.” Sherlock tugged his scarf around his neck. “Everyone should have their world turned upside down every once in a while,” he added over his shoulder as he ambled down the stairs.

John just groaned and knocked his forehead on his knees, thrice, for luck.


End file.
